This Year'e Themes (Band Names)

What’s in a name?

Every year there seems to be common trends/fads/themes in the names of bands. Types of names seem to drift in and out of fashion. One of the most common names is a band named after the person (or persons) that formed the band. Aside from egomania, I see no reason for this – it’s boring, unoriginal and almost always wholly unearned. I actively avoid bands that use just the name of the founder/lead singer etc… DJ’s that just go by their name are especially suspect, because its usually not enough just to go by their REAL name but commonly they also use pictures of themselves on their album covers (witness Paul van Dyke as the prime example) – totally unwarranted.

So skipping bands named after themselves this year’s biggest theme seems to fall under Family & Kids type names:

Location/Place names are also popular but the motivation of these bands is very different. You have bands like Portishead (who are from a place near Portishead, England) who probably couldn’t think of name so picked a local place and then a band like “I’m from Barcelona” who are actually from Sweden so were going for that 90s irony thing.
Portishead
Dimitri from Paris
I’m from Barcelona
Architecture in Helsinki
Manchester Orchestra
AUSTIN TV
And then the more abstract location names:
The Streets
The Field
Islands

Another common theme that never goes out of fashion is sex. And where would Drugs and Rock & Roll be without sex?
The Breeders
Orgasmic Curses
American Bang (a double entendre to be sure)
Holy Fuck (ibid)
The Bird & the Bee

Which also leads to this year’s animal which is oddly: the Bee. Because of:
The Bird & the Bee
The Bees

Re: This Year'e Themes (Band Names)

Originally Posted by CalmerThanYou

bored? hehe...

Yes bored and also I wanted to start a thread without the possibility of someone saying that there were already 12 threads just like it. I am pretty sure the number of threads like this one are less than 12... :P

Re: This Year'e Themes (Band Names)

Re: This Year'e Themes (Band Names)

Another catagory I was toying with but seemd a stretch was the elements:
Aesop Rock
Spank Rock
Goldfrapp (stupid name in soooo many ways)
Santogold
Chromeo

Also with "Does it offend you, yeah?" we have an opportunity for a theme. We could have the "Yeah yeah yeahs," "Clap your hands say yeah" and "Yaz(oo)" all added making a pretty strong theme. The last one has been suggested as a possible add.